Apple debuts first iPad 2 ad: ‘We Believe’

With the initial buzz surrounding the iPad 2 now gone, Apple has released the first television advertisement for its second-generation tablet.

Like everything else Apple, the company’s newest ad, dubbed “We Believe,” continues Apple’s marketing message that the technology we use is less about the device itself than how it fits into our lives. This time, however, they just come right out and say it.

“This is what we believe: Technology alone is not enough,” says the slow, soothing voice-over at the opening of the ad. “Faster, thinner, lighter — those are all good things. But when technology gets out of the way, everything becomes more delightful, even magical.”

Apple’s governing philosophy is, of course, accompanied by bodiless hands pinching, swiping and zooming a wide variety of apps that are accessible on the iPad 2.

All of this carefully crafted marketing theater has a single purpose: To convince consumers that Apple’s iPad 2 is the best tablet on the market. That it’s easier to use, and more useful in general, than anything thing else out there, like the Motorola Xoom.

It’s not as though people need much convincing, however. The device has become so hard to come by that resellers have made a killing hocking the devices on eBay for between $200 and $400 above the retail price of the device, depending on the model.

Of course, a little more than a third of iPad 2 buyers on eBay came from countries where Apple’s newest tablet hadn’t yet been release. But that still leaves 65 percent of US customers who were so anxious to get their hands on the device that they paid a greatly inflated price.

With the tablet war getting more intense as the weeks go on, however, it never hurts to reinforce your message, and get your product in front of as many eyes as possible. Which is precisely what Apple is doing here.